NEWS AND VIEWS
Addressing the after-hours issue NZVA President Grant McCullough has some thoughts on how we can all do our bit to ease the pain associated with after-hours services. VCNZ’S CODE OF Professional Conduct for Veterinarians legally requires veterinarians to provide after-hours services so that animals don’t suffer unreasonable or unnecessary pain or distress. Those services must be sufficiently resourced. When I was a young practising veterinarian, we were expected to accept the role of providing these services and just get on with the job. But it took its toll on people more than we cared to admit. These days we see people leaving the profession because after-hours services are affecting their work-life balance. Dedicated small animal after-hours clinics can help ease the burden for other small animal practices, but there are no stand-alone after-hours clinics for large animals. This means large animal practices must provide those services either on their own or by cooperating on a roster system with neighbouring practices. Given this, it may be worth considering setting up dedicated large animal after-hours practices – like small animal ones in cities. In my opinion we also need to see more practices sharing the workload of after-hours services. I encourage all veterinarians to act collegially, support each other and cooperate. Concern for safety is another issue. A veterinarian providing after-hours services usually does so on their own and call-outs are often late at night or early in the morning. Should they be accompanied by a veterinary nurse or a veterinary technician? At the very least, others in the practice should know when they’re on call-out and where they’ll be working. It can also be difficult for on-call veterinarians to work with species they don’t see day to day and with whom they have little expertise, with no support from colleagues who have more specialist knowledge. In recognition of these challenges, practices should consider compensating their staff for after-hours
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services or providing them with incentives to be on call. It would mean increasing the fees for clients, but this could incentivise them to consider carefully whether their problems really are emergencies. Clients often have unrealistic expectations of after-hours services, and we’ve allowed them to persist out of fear of push-back – such as through complaints to VCNZ or criticisms on social media. This fear is generally unfounded, as VCNZ has a realistic attitude to after-hours services and the difficulties veterinarians face, including travel times to call-outs. We also cannot buy into fears around social media, as commentary there can be overblown or based on knee-jerk reactions. Instead we should try to foster excellent, communicative relationships with our clients that will weather the storms of any issues that may arise. Another possible solution is to set up an afterhours call centre, staffed by veterinary nurses who triage calls before contacting veterinarians – a set-up similar to that for human healthcare through Healthline. Is there a role for the NZVA in helping to build a national service like this – or for veterinary technicians to respond to more straightforward emergencies, operating under veterinary operating instructions to do things such as administer epidurals? There are likely no quick fixes to the challenges of after-hours, but work is already underway to progress some of these ideas. However, real change will only be possible if all those in the profession act collegially and clinic leaders lead the charge. My hope is that we see more people working together to improve the veterinary after-hours situation and for it to no longer be a reason for veterinarians leaving the profession. Grant McCullough, NZVA President grant.mccullough@vets.org.nz
